A Colombian court on Monday, July 28, found ex-president Alvaro Uribe guilty of witness tampering in a case that saw him become the South American country's first-ever former head of state convicted of a crime. The 73-year-old, who was president from 2002 to 2010, was found guilty of trying to persuade witnesses to lie for him in a separate investigation. Uribe risks a 12-year prison sentence in the highly politicized case.
The matter dates to 2012, when Uribe accused leftist senator Ivan Cepeda before the Supreme Court of hatching a plot to falsely link him to right-wing paramilitary groups involved in Colombia's long-standing armed conflict. The court decided against prosecuting Cepeda and turned its sights on his claims against Uribe instead.
Paramilitary groups emerged in the 1980s in Colombia to fight Marxist guerrillas that had taken up arms against the state two decades earlier with the stated goal of combating poverty and political marginalization, especially in rural areas. A plethora of armed groups adopted cocaine as their main source of income, the genesis of a deadly rivalry for resources and trafficking routes that continues to this day.
Uribe was a politician on the right of the political spectrum – like all Colombian presidents before current leader Gustavo Petro, who unseated Uribe's Democratic Center party in 2022 elections.
During his tenure, Uribe led a relentless military campaign against drug cartels and the FARC guerrilla army that signed a peace deal with his successor Juan Manuel Santos in 2016.
After Cepeda accused him of having had ties to paramilitary groups responsible for human rights violations, Uribe is alleged to have contacted jailed ex-fighters to lie for him. He claims he only wanted to convince them to tell the truth.